Miss. reports its 5th death tied to winter storm

JACKSON -- Mississippi authorities say the deaths of five people have been linked to this week's winter storm.

The latest came Wednesday when a vehicle struck the back of a stalled tractor-trailer in Smith County, killing one of the passengers in the moving vehicle.

Four people died early Tuesday in a mobile home fire in Itawamba County.

Hundreds of wrecks and road closures were reported as an Arctic front dropped ice and snow in parts of the state.

National Weather Service forecasters said no additional accumulation of freezing rain, sleet or snow was expected late in the state Wednesday, but bitter cold temperatures would remain through early today with a gradual rise statewide into the 50s by the weekend.

Gov. Phil Bryant said state offices in areas affected by snow and ice are scheduled to reopen today, though agency directors can decide to keep some closed, as needed.

In Simpson County, a motorist escaped injury when his SUV skidded off a county road and hit a natural gas regulator station near D'Lo, said Mississippi Emergency Management Agency spokesman Greg Flynn.

Flynn said the accident caused a fire and local officials evacuated about 16 families in the area as a precaution. Flynn said the fire caused no injuries and was extinguished, but gas continued to leak from the regulator station. He said a repair crew from Gulf South Pipeline, which owns the station, was headed to D'Lo. The American Red Cross set up an emergency shelter, Flynn said.

In the Mississippi Delta, catfish farmer Ben Pentecost of Doddsville said a layer of ice coated his family's ponds. Pentecost, who has raised catfish for 33 years, says in an interview Wednesday with the Associated Press that he thought most of the fish would survive, though they'd be stressed by the cold.

"As long as they're in the water, they're not going to die," Pentecost said.

He said on Tuesday, crews at his ponds loaded catfish onto trucks to go to processing plants. They worked in 19-degree weather and their nylon nets were frozen stiff.